A slot-in optical disc drive has the features of pretty appearance and easy operation. A user can easily put a disc into the optical disc drive by a loading/ejecting apparatus of the slot-in optical disc drive. If they want to eject the disc, they can push an ejecting button to drive the loading/ejecting apparatus to eject the disc. Because the loading/ejecting apparatus is driven by the motor, when the system of the optical disc drive is broken or loses power, the loading/ejecting apparatus won't eject the disc automatically. At the time, it is necessary to drive an emergency ejecting apparatus to eject the disc.
For example, the US patent publication number 2004/0223420 published to Kazuo Yokota shows a slot-in optical disc drive 1 including an emergency ejecting apparatus for ejecting the disc manually. The optical disc drive 1 has a loading motor 21 connected to the emergency ejecting apparatus, and then the emergency ejecting apparatus is connected to a loading/ejecting apparatus. The loading/ejecting apparatus includes an ejecting lever 17 and a guide lever 18. The loading motor 21 drives the emergency ejecting apparatus, and then the loading/ejecting apparatus is driven to load or eject a disc. The emergency ejecting apparatus includes a loading gear unit G1 and a rack gear unit G2 with special structure for meshing with the loading gear unit G1. Moreover, the back end of the rack gear unit G2 is connected to the loading/ejecting apparatus. The loading motor 21 drives the loading gear unit G1 so that the rack gear unit G2 moves in the optical disc drive, and then the loading/ejecting apparatus is driven to load or eject the disc by the movement of the rack gear unit G2.
When the optical disc drive 1 can't eject the disc automatically because of the system breaking down or the loss of the power, the loading motor 21 cannot drive the loading gear unit G1. Therefore, the loading gear unit G1 and the rack gear unit G2 are locked because they are meshed with the loading motor 21. A user has to put an emergency pin P into a through hole 3b formed in the bezel 3 of the optical disc drive 1. The position of the through hole 3b is set corresponding to the driving gear set G1, so a user can insert the emergency pin P to loose the connection between the loading gear unit G1 and the loading motor 21. When the loading gear unit G1 can rotate freely without being constrained by the loading motor 21, the user has to insert the emergency pin P into a through hole 3c formed in the bezel 3 again. The position of the through hole 3c is set corresponding to the rack gear unit G2 and the emergency pin P can push the rack gear unit G2 to move in the optical disc drive. Therefore, the loading/ejecting apparatus is driven by the rack gear unit G2 to eject the disc.
However, the emergency ejecting apparatus described above comprises many components. For example, the loading gear unit G1 not only has worm gear 22 and double gears 23, 24, and 25, but also has a slider member 31, two pivotal support pins 28, and 32 and a tension coil spring 33. The connections of the components are very complex, so if one of them is useless, the emergency ejecting apparatus can't eject a disc manually. Moreover, the more components of the emergency ejecting apparatus, the bigger size of the optical disc drive will be for installing the emergency ejecting apparatus.
Moreover, a user has to insert the emergency pin P into the through hole 3b and 3c to drive the emergency ejecting apparatus to eject the disc. Also, a user has to make sure the manual ejection step is correct. Therefore, it's really inconvenient for a user to manually eject the disc.
Therefore, the present invention is to find a way to decrease the components of the emergency ejecting apparatus of the optical disc drive and to decrease the size of the optical disc drive for overcoming the drawbacks of the emergency ejecting apparatus mentioned above.